Changes to CPD Rules for BC Lawyers

Practice Point

As your favourite CPD provider, CLEBC would like to let you know about the below Law Society of BC changes to CPD rules effective January 1, 2019.

View recorded courses on your own for CPD

Under the old CPD rules, you needed to view pre-recorded courses in the presence of another lawyer or articled student to qualify for CPD credit. Now, you can earn CPD by viewing pre-recorded courses on your own.

Take advantage of this change with CLEBC’s Courses on Demand, which offers you 24/7 online access to thousands of pre-recorded presentations from CLEBC courses, so you can complete all your CPD credits by yourself, in one place, for a one-time annual fee.

Carry-over of credits

Under the old CPD rules, you weren’t able to carry over any CPD credits earned in one year to another. Now, you can carry over up to six CPD credits from one year to the next, starting with carry-over from 2019 to 2020. You will still need to report your CPD by December 31 each year, and must complete at least six CPD credits within any calendar year.

Exclusion to the carry-over option applies to the ethics and practice management requirement. You must still complete two hours of “professional responsibility and ethics, practice management, client care and relations” credit each year.

Other changes to CPD rules

Additional changes effective January 1, 2019 include:

If you claim CPD credit through teaching, you can now claim credit for teaching the same subject matter up to twice in a calendar year. Under the previous rules, you could only earn teaching credit for the first time teaching a subject matter, but not repeat teaching.

You can now receive CPD credit for writing for law firms or other websites if the content is substantially related to the law or practice of law. Material primarily for marketing purposes will not be eligible. Writing on blogs or wikis is not eligible unless submissions are subject to editorial oversight.

You can now qualify as a mentor and earn CPD credits through mentoring if you have practised five years out of the past six years. Previously, you needed to have practised for seven out of the past ten years to qualify as a mentor.